Cru Jones Society

It’s January, and many of our readers are still preoccupied with scraping ice off their windshields and shoveling snow from their driveways. One of the nice things about Southern Arizona is that the chill is already mostly gone in the air and we’re treated to daily high temperatures of around 75 degrees.  All of this nice weather has me thinking ahead to the summer movie season when we’ll all be ducking out of the summer heat to soak up some sweet movie theater air conditioning and wildly overpriced snacks while eagerly watching all the $200 Million corpses Hollywood will dig up this year in an effort to earn your $8 at the door, and more importantly $20 later for the DVD.  Which movies will surprise audiences this summer, which will disappoint, and which ones will prove to be the terrible abomination against the original that everyone but the people who produced it knew they would be?  There’s no need to actually see them, Limon is here several months in advance with thoughts on the issue.

A Special thanks to the folks over at Movie Moron for doing the leg work on this one and compiling a comprehensive preview of the Summer’s upcoming movies.  This year we’ll be treated to two comic book adaptions, two aging child stars desperately trying to look young for at least one more summer’s paycheck, two action figures turned movie franchises, and two guaranteed self serving steaming piles of waste thanks to Dan Brown and Roland Emmerich.

The Watchmen:

Starring: Carla Gugino, Jeffrey Dean Morgan, Malin Akerman, Matthew Goode, and probably some other people you’ve never heard of.

CJS Thinks: Along the same lines as Frank Miller’s graphic novel turned movie successes, The Watchmen is a DC graphic novel turned movie by the director of 300, about an alternate history of the United States that has all the fanboys who know way more than me about this sort of thing all in a fervor.  So far, everything points to them knowing what they’re talking about.  This is one of the few original franchises turned high budget blockbuster we’ll have a chance to see this summer, and assuming the whole thing doesn’t go completely awry.  The Watchmen is on pace to be one of the coolest movies this year.  I’ll be there.

Street Fighter:  The Legend of Chun Li

Starring:  Kristin Kreuk, Moon Bloodgood, Michael Clarke Duncan, Chris Klein

CJS Thinks:   I wouldn’t be going out on a limb much to say that this movie is probably going to suck, after all movies based on video games don’t exactly have the best track record.  Maybe my brain is slightly clouded over thanks to Kristin Kreuk, but this movie looks like it should at least be better than the original, but that really isn’t saying much.  I can wait for the DVD.

X Men Origins: Wolverine

Starring: Hugh Jackman, Ryan Reynolds, Lynn Collins

CJS Thinks: Wolverine is overrated, and Hugh Jackman is a dancing fruitcake. But on the other hand, he can grow a bitchin’ set of ‘chops.  The X-Men franchise really ran its course about half way through X3, with X2 being the only honest to goodness excellent movie out of the three.  We were all just too busy in fanboy heaven upon seeing the X-men come to life on the big screen to notice.  There’s a chance X-Men Origins: Wolverine will inject some new life in the franchise, but with three Spider-Man movies in the can, four X-Men movies, two versions of The Hulk, two too many movies about the Fantastic Four, and a Punisher movie with another one in the pipes, Marvel really has to be scraping the bottom of the barrel.  I’ll be waiting to see what some other chumps say after risking their hard earned money before I go.

The Hannah Montana Movie

Starring: Miley Cyrus, Billy Ray Cyrus, Emily Osment, Various other celebrities trying desperately to be hip.

CJS Thinks: Is Miley Cyrus old enough for it not to be creepy to think she’s hot yet? Teenage girls will be flocking in droves to see what is most likely Disney’s last Hannah Montana Hurrah before finding some other prepubescent girl to exploit for billions of dollars over the next 5 or so years.  I’ll be staying away. I don’t want to look like a pervert.

Star Trek

Starring:  Chris Pine, Zachary Quinto, Eric Bana, John Cho, Wynona Rider

CJS Thinks: The whole Star Trek thing kinda took a nose dive with Enterprise, which is surprising considering most people thought that the series had enough of a cult following to endure forever.  Star Trek promises to revitalize the name by drawing in old fans and introducing a new generation to the original.  We don’t know if it will work, but I do know that I’m hoping William Shatner will make a cameo on behalf of priceline.com.  I’ll be waiting to watch it on Netflix, where nobody can call me a nerd for watching it.

Bruno

Starring: Sacha Baron Cohen, Alice Evans, Ben Youcef

CJS Thinks: Smart money is on this movie emotionally scarring many of the people who thought Borat was awesome, but only the ones who thought it was awesome for all the wrong reasons.   Chances are that Bruno will be as hilarious as it is disturbing and revealing as Sacha Baron Cohen makes rednecks everyone uncomfortable about homosexuality.  I’ll wager it will be the best comedy of the summer.  I‘ll be there.

Angels and Demons

Starring:  Tom Hanks, Ayelet Zurer, Ewan McGregor

CJS Thinks: Dan Brown sucks, so do all of his books, and so did the movie version of The DaVinci Code. Has Tom Hanks gone senile? He’d be better off making Big 2: Even Bigger than wasting his time with this one. We get it Dan Brown, the Catholic church is corrupt.  I learned that in high school history class. Are we supposed to be shocked? I ‘ll be avoiding this one like Church on Super Bowl Sunday.

Terminator: Salvation

Starring: Christian Bale, Moon Bloodgood, Helena Bonham Carter, Michael Ironside

CJS Thinks: There almost seems no point in making this movie, however the combination of ubiquitous director McG and actor Christian Bale might actually make for a combination worth watching.  Also, the promise of huge scale sci-fi battles between terminator robots and the remains of humanity excites the nerds in all of us that have been fantasizing about how it would all go down since we got a glimpse of it all in Terminator 2.  I don’t have high expectations for this movie, but it would be really really nice to be pleasantly surprised by this one.  I ‘ll be there, with lowered expectations

Up

Starring: John Ratzenberger, Ed Asner, Christopher Plummer

CJS Thinks: Pixar hasn’t missed yet, although its latest offerings have been some of its weakest, and Wall-E suggests that someone there may be more interested in getting all preachy on us instead of just making awesome movies.  Either way… I’ll be there

The Year One

Starring:  Jack Black, Olivia Wilde, Hank Azaria, David Cross

CJS Thinks: This prehistoric adventure about cavemen in, you guessed it, year one, sounds like a thinly veiled excuse to put Jack Black in front of a camera for approximately 90 minutes and just see what happens, but I can’t argue with a formula that obviously works.  I’ll be there, hopefully after a few beers.

Fast and Furious

Starring: Vin Diesel, Paul Walker, Michelle Rodriguez, Jordana Brewster

CJS Thinks: The original cast is back, although considering none of them aside from Vin Diesel have been in a decent movie since the original, I don’t think its really much of a feat. Fast and Furious sans “The” appears to feature the new Dodge Challenger surely among many hundreds of other suped up rides, and will more than likely give all the ricer kiddies with fart cans on their beat up 1996 Honda CRX hatchbacks more than enough car porn to make them unable to resist peeling out of the movie theater parking lot impressing nobody but each other after the movie is over. Overall the entire thing doesn’t look terrible.  I ‘ll be turning my brain off and enjoying this one for a couple hours.

Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen

Starring: Shia LeBouf, Megan Fox, Tyrese Gibson, Giant Robots

CJS Thinks: Nobody is more excited to see this movie than General Motors, but will the company even be around long enough to allow us the honor of paying $8 for the honor of a two hour long commercial for cars that I don’t give a fuck about?  Apparently Michael Bay wrote most of the Transformers sequel himself thanks to last year’s writers strike.  Trey Parker and Matt Stone are most assuredly waiting with pens poised ready to make a parody of the whole thing on South Park.  I’ll be there, attempting to ignore the Kid from Holes, but only because Megan Fox is back, and I’m a sucker for a giant robots beating each other up.

2012: Doomsday

Starring:  A bunch of expensive special effects and no real story.

CJS Thinks: Roland Emerich is responsible for such wastes of time as Eight Legged Freaks, The Day After Tomorrow, and 10,000 B.C – the end of which it would appear he stole almost shot for shot from 300, however he was also behind Independence Day and Stargate. So, honestly this one could go either way.  For me, so far it doesn’t look promising.  2012 gives is a glimpse into the theories of all the conspiracy nuts who believe the world will be ending in 2012 because an extinct civilization decided to make a calendar that spirals inward, and they ran out of room in the middle sometime in 2012.  The only real question, will this movie top The Day After Tomorrow as many CJS readers’ pick for the worst movie they’ve ever sat through? Only time will tell.  We may watch it on Netflix, but only to scoff over how absurd it is.

Harry [butthole pussy] Potter and the Half Blood Prince

Starring: The kid who looks kind of like Elijah Wood but isn’t, and some other people, but not that one old guy because he died already.

CJS Thinks: I gave the first Harry potter movie a chance, right up until they started playing that dumb game with the flying balls and broomsticks. The rules don’t make any sense. What kind of sport leaves the means of victory in the hands of two players who are participating in an entirely separate contest from everyone else on the team?  Why do any of the other players even matter? This sport is more pointless than the first round of Double Dare.  I ‘ll be skipping it, but I’m probably the only one.

GI Joe: Rise of Cobra

Starring:  Dennis Quaid, Channing Tatum, Sienna Miller, Marlon Williams

CJS Thinks: This is the movie most likely to trample all over one of the beloved icons of our youth. I  can’t imagine any way this movie could possibly not suck.  I ‘ll be missing this one on principal alone.

So, there you have it all the upcoming summer blockbusters that I’m aware of.  When it comes down to it, I’m a sucker for a movie and it sounds like I’ll be having as much fun this summer at the theaters as with any summer.  Be sure to keep your eyes peeled for a forthcoming Monday Confessional where you’ll get your chance to tell us all which summer movies you’re looking forward to, and which you think would have been better off left unmade.  Until next time, I’m off to watch Kevin James fall down for an hour and a half or so.  Winter movies just don’t quite have the same oomph…

mailto: senor.limon@crujonessociety.com